


Impetus

by Beth Harker (Beth_Harker)



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Low Self-Esteem, M/M, Post-Canon, Swearing, ultimately more fluffy than angsty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 17:24:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15393696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Harker/pseuds/Beth%20Harker
Summary: Michael and Jeremy are both having trouble restarting their lives in the immediate aftermath of the Squip, so Jeremy washes Michael's hair for him.





	Impetus

**Author's Note:**

> I've got [this](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14306460/chapters/33007368/) fic where I take prompts. This story is in response to this prompt from alicorniansheepyllama: 
> 
> ****This is great! Can you write one where Jeremy ignoring Michael during the squip incident really affected Michael, and he's kinda depressed, tired, quiet, and has stopped caring about his appearance in general to the point where you would be concerned just by looking at him. So then Jeremy has his first day back at school, but doesn't tell Michael, so he sees first hand how bad Michael has gotten. I'd guess he was already like that during the play, but Jeremy didn't notice until now. Having it end in a fluffy comforty conversation and a real apology from Jeremy would be awesome!****

Jeremy doesn't tell anybody when he’ll return to school, because he doesn't know. In the eight days since his release from the hospital, he's developed a routine. He’ll open his eyes before his alarm goes off at 6:30, take a deep breath, and whisper “one, two, three, go!” before launching himself into a sitting position as fast as he can, hoping that the momentum will be enough to get him to the door before the gnawing in his stomach gets too bad. 

On the first three days, he doesn't even make it fully out of bed. On the third day, he gets as far as the bedroom door. On the fifth, he goes downstairs to eat breakfast, and on the seventh, he sits on his front porch with his head between his knees as the school bus goes by. 

On the eighth day, Jeremy says fuck it, and decides to just go for it. 

According to Christine, eight is a lucky number, because it sounds like the Chinese word for treasure. Jeremy been talking to Christine a lot. She's good at talking in the same way that Michael is, which is to say she never shuts up, and that's exactly what Jeremy needs. He hasn't been willing to push his luck with the whole dating thing, but there's something nice about being able to call Christine, and know that she’ll just talk and talk, about everything from current events, to Tony predictions, to shoelaces. Besides, the lucky number thing might be fake or whatever, but as Jeremy struggles to find the impetus to pull his life together, that number is there like a shining beacon. 

It turns to burden as the morning progresses. 

Jeremy brushes his teeth for eight seconds, but then he begins to worry that he might have forgotten a number, so he moves it to eighteen seconds, and then eighty-eight. Then he remembers that the number four is supposed to be _bad_ luck (it sounds like the Chinese word for death), so he re-counts, but he skips fours and multiples of four. _Then_ he starts to wonder about other languages, because the German word for six sounds like the English word for sex, which he is _totally_ allowed to think of, because he is a full-fledged human who can make whatever pitiful, disgusting choices he wants, so there. 

“This is lame,” Jeremy says aloud, toothbrush dangling from his mouth like a foamy plastic cigarette. He looks in the mirror, and sees a skinny kid with big teeth, and haunted eyes staring back at him. 

“Fuck numbers,” Jeremy says to his reflection. “I can do this.” 

He does a number-free rebrushing of his teeth, to undo the numbered attempt. He sucks at math, and numbers have never been his thing anyway. He washes his face, combs his hair, gets dressed, and goes out the door. He's not sure how many times he checks if the door is locked, because he's not counting. He needs today to be an okay day. If he's learned anything from the Squip, it's that good mental health is good and he's going to be good and mentally healthy. Walking to school is just the first step! 

The students of Middleborough are extra shiny when Jeremy gets there. Chloe is wearing a shiny smile coated in shiny lipgloss. Brooke’s nails are shiny, pink, and chipped only a little. Jenna’s smartphone has a bright and sparkling rhinestone case. They greet Jeremy as he goes to his locker. Jake’s brand new wheelchair is positively glistening. He holds up his hand as Jeremy rushes by, and it’s only when Jeremy has passed him by several inches and his hand is still up, that Jeremy comes to the tentative conclusion that maybe that high five hanging expectantly in the air is meant for him, and shit, he’d better take it. So he he does, and it's weak as hell, but Jake grins at him and wheels off, as if this is normal and they always high five each other when they pass in the hallways. Jeremy leans against his locker, and takes a deep breath. He wipes the sweat off his face, and turns the lock in the familiar combination. He opens the door, and an avalanche of flowers and Get Well Soon cards come tumbling out. 

And if Jeremy were to make a commercial advertising Squips, that's exactly what he'd show. There would be nice music and a montage of high fives, cards, and accolades to distract from the voice over about how the side-effects might include anything from strained friendships, to damaged sense of self, to arson. None of that would matter to people desperate enough to consider robot pills that take over your brain to be a good remedy in the first place. 

——————

The thing with Squip side-effects is that they don't effect just the person who takes it. They get right down deep into everything and everybody around them. So Jake can't walk anymore, and Brooke is just a little more guarded than she was before, and Christine needs time to ponder the dichotomy between being herself and having an easy life. 

And then there's Michael. Unlike practically everyone else, Michael is the very opposite of shiny. Jeremy fucked up there. He fucked up so hard. He fucked up with his lucky numbers in the morning, and he fucked up when he decided to let the Squip block out his only friend, and he fucked up being born, but whatever. It's not like _he's_ feeling the consequences. Everybody else is doing that for him, because he's a bad person and he sucks. 

Jeremy first sees Michael on the way to science class. His friend waves, but doesn't take off his headphones, or lower his hood, or stop to talk, and Jeremy freezes in the hallway, clenching and unclenching his hands, until an unwelcome voice tells him to stop. 

But Michael. It's like he's in those movies, where normal people are replaced by Doppelgängers and something is off about, like, their eyes, or their hands, or their walk or their _face_. 

And Jeremy doesn't know quite clearly if it's Michael's face, or his eyes, or his hands, or his walk… Maybe everything at once, because there _is_ something off about Michael’s face, and that something is the scraggly beginnings of a beard. Back in sophomore year, the two of them had tried to have a beard growing contest, as a right of passage into Manhood or whatever. Jeremy hadn't been able to grow much of anything. Michael had, but the prickles and itchiness of it had left him twitching and scratching constantly at his face, and two days in he'd given up, claiming that he'd rather grow a third nipple on his forehead than some dumb ass beard. The one he has now is just a shadow, but it's got him rubbing his face like he did the first time, and it’s too unkempt to be deliberate. 

The way Michael walks is wrong too. Everybody has always said that Michael’s walk is weird, especially when he does that kind of skip-step-skip-leap-step-step-skip thing, but it's much weirder to see him trudge around and not do it. There are dark circles under his eyes. His hood is up, and his headphones are on. 

It all becomes much clearer when lunch rolls around, and Jeremy takes his old seat across from Michael, in the school cafeteria. Again, Michael smiles at him in the old lazy way, but he's just sitting there, with some lumpy cafeteria pudding that he's barely bothering to eat. 

“‘Sup?” Michael says, and that's it. He doesn't go into a rant about gross cafeteria food, or bird migrations, or Bob Marley. 

“Um…” Jeremy answers. He taps his temple. Back in the hospital, when Michael was visiting, that'd become the universal gesture for Squip stuff. 

“Voices?” Michael asks. 

“Good ones! Normal ones!” 

Another smile. “Hey, that's good. Good job.” 

“I mean, it's like—”

Jeremy doesn't get to finish his thought, because Brooke and Chloe sit down, deep in gossip about Madeline’s adventures in lying about her nationality and being a “skank” (Chloe’s words, not Jeremy’s). Jake and Rich follow. Michael turns up his music. It's like he's there, but he's gone. It's like he's so far away. 

——————-

A week passes. Having gone to school once, Jeremy finds he's pretty much able to make it in every day, and at least go through the motions. Michael remains grimy and barely communicative, though not unfriendly. 

“What are you doing after school?” Michael asks on Friday, when he runs into Jeremy after forth period. 

“I'm— Christine.” Jeremy blurts out. 

“Nice to meet you, Christine. I’m dad.” 

“I—” Jeremy reddens. This is the most he's gotten out of Michael in days. He can't mess this up. 

“There's a bot online that does that,” Michael goes on. “It's got an algorithm to find posts where people say ‘I'm bla bla bla’ and then it responds with ‘nice to meet you, bla bla bla, I’m—”

“…Dad?” 

“Right.” 

“Dude, never compare yourself to my father again. That's just weird.” 

“Didn't he ground you?”

“He can't do it,” Jeremy says, with a tinge of regret that is fucking strange, considering how inconvenient it would be to be grounded right now. “But he's wearing pants.” 

“Like a champion.” 

“Totally. And I can't come over tonight because I have a thing with Christine, but I could tomorrow, and—”

Michael puts up his hands. “When did I ask you to come over?” 

“It's just Friday, and usually—” Jeremy’s mouth is going dry. Usually he goes over to Michael’s on Friday, and they play video games, but it was stupid of him to presume. Maybe Michael never wants him to come over again. Maybe that's over and he's never going to get it back. 

“There hasn't been any usual for a while now,” Michael reminds, and it's like a chasm opening in the pit of Jeremy’s stomach. 

“Can I come over on Saturday?” Jeremy asks. 

A moment passes, then Michael nods, but it's still doppelgänger Michael. It's like there's no light in him. It's like Saturday will be a day of reckoning. 

“Cool,” Jeremy croaks out. 

“Cool,” Michael echoes.

—————————-

Michael’s basement is a weed-scented mess when Jeremy comes by, which is to say it's completely normal. Probably Michael has already been smoking by the time Jeremy gets there, which is also pretty normal. They boot up the Nintendo to play a few rounds of Mario Cart, which isn't unusual, but which feels very mechanical all of a sudden, like playing video games with Rich and the Squips had felt. Human interactions are governed by certain codes. Teenage male friends, for example, trade jokes, drink soda, and play video games. Sitting next to another teenage boy and going through these motions symbolizes friendship, and as such these motions are acceptable as long as certain parameters, such as chillness and popularity, are met. 

Besides the game, Michael offers the customary soda and chips. That is friend behavior. He challenges Jeremy to Rainbow Road, reminding him how he sucks at it. That is also friend behavior. In the background, he's got a song playing on his computer. That is Michael behavior. It's not in English, so it takes Jeremy a while to realize that it's the same song, playing over and over again. That's Michael In Trouble behavior. 

Listening to the same song on repeat to when he's not okay is something Michael has done for as long as Jeremy has known him. When Michael was five, and his hamster died, he'd marked the occasion by listening to the cake song from Lazy Town for three days straight. When he was fourteen, he'd preempted the scariness of coming out of as gay with about seven day stretch of wallowing in his completely unironic love of Wonderwall. 

“How long has this been on?” Jeremy asks, gesturing towards Michael’s computer speakers. 

A shrug. “Like two months. It happens.” 

Jeremy exhales through his teeth. 

“It's not a big deal. We can listen to something else or whatever. Come on.” 

Michael stands up abruptly, dropping his controller, and leaving Mario to skid out of control on the  
TV screen. He grabs his laptop, and flops back on his bed.

“There's like, YouTube videos and shit to watch,” Michael says. “So let's watch it.” 

“Youtube videos?” Jeremy lies down on his stomach next to Michael. 

“Yeah, like—” Michael opens up YouTube, and scrolls a bit, tongue jutting out between his teeth as if in deep concentration. 

“What're you looking for?” 

“Meaning and purpose in life. Something funny.” He clicks. An ad, and then screeching. 

“… Uh, Michael.. are we listening to recordings of the old dialup internet connection sound?”

“I’m nostalgic.”

“For a time before you were born?” 

“Yes.”

Another ad plays, followed by the same damn sound effect. And then again. And again. 

“For the love of fuck, Michael…”

Michael closes his laptop with a decisive click, to glare down at Jeremy. “What?” he asks. “If this wasn't how you wanted to spend your day, you could’ve just not come over. You know that, right?” 

“Is it how you want to spend yours?” 

“Why else would I be doing it?” 

_To punish me_ , Jeremy wants to say, but he catches the way that Michael takes off his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose, and he holds his tongue. Maybe Michael is caught in a loop. Maybe he's doing the same thing that Jeremy had for those first eight days back at home, when just getting out of bed had been near insurmountable. Jeremy rolls on to his side, placing a hand on Michael’s knee. No reaction. 

Jeremy is all too familiar with the kinds of loops a person could get stuck in, and that awareness is not just a post-Squip thing. He'd been in a really bad one the summer after his mom left. It had gotten to the point where he couldn't get himself to the grocery store to buy laundry detergent in his mother’s stead, and so he'd just gone a month without washing his clothes, letting himself go further and further, because that’d been all he could do. Michael had been the one to help him finally, and it wasn't like Michael had done it all for him, but he kind of _had_ , and then it'd kind of been okay. 

So Jeremy looks Michael over, searching for that one part he can restore to normal. He really and truly takes time to look at the uneven beard, and the way Michael’s socks are swampy and crusted over, like he's been wearing the same pair for over a week. He probably hasn't bathed either. Jeremy looks and looks, trying to find where he can help. 

“This is going to sound stupid,” Jeremy says. He doesn't wait for Michael to respond, but forces himself to continue before he can lose his nerve. “I mean, it's really, really stupid, actually, but could I… um… could I wash your hair for you? If you’re cool with that.” 

Michael makes a choked sound, then he laughs. “Dude, you want to wash my hair?” 

“Well, you helped me wash my clothes—”

“I did?”

“S-sophomore year. After—” Jeremy waves his hand, gesturing into the distance. “You helped me wash my clothes.”

“Ok. Ok. I got it. But, you know, those weren't physically a part of you.” 

“And my kitchen!”

“Also not a part of your physical person.” Michael puts his glasses back on. “Is my hair that gross?” he asks frankly. 

Jeremy shrugs, then nods. “I mean, you don't have to let me do it, but I've just… I've missed you. And I thought maybe I could… wash… God, sorry, this is stupid.”

“You’re trying to fix things.” Michael’s voice is flat. 

Jeremy swallows hard, past the lump in his throat. 

“You’re fucking ridiculous,” Michael says. “Let's do this.” 

“Let's… what?” 

“You heard what I said. In the sink, right? I'm not in a stripping kind of mood.” 

“No. Yeah. That's fair. The sink is good. With clothes on. I'll get the… stuff… the washing hair stuff. The stuff you wash hair with.” 

“The shampoo?” 

“Right! Shampoo. Conditioner. The whole shebang.”

(‘Shebang’ is a terrible word. The Squip would throw a fit.)  
“Okay.” Michael says quietly. “Okay. You do that. I'll meet you in the kitchen.” 

Jeremy gets up to leave the room. When he stops in the doorway to look back, Michael hasn't gotten up yet, and he's listening to the dialup sound again, but that's his prerogative. If he wants to use bizarre coping methods fortify himself for the hair washing to come, that's his choice. 

(Jeremy never found Michael’s coping methods all that bizarre before the Squip, and he'd had no right to. After all, Michael had never once questioned the mess that was Jeremy, just taken him for who and what he was.)

There are several types of shampoo in Michael’s bathroom, which Jeremy should've planned for, considering Mrs. Mell works at a cosmetics company. It's not that the dozens of bottles and things are unfamiliar, either. Jeremy has slept over a million and one times, and usually he's just grabbed whatever for his morning shower, but Michael is nothing if not a creature of habit, and Jeremy can't believe that he wouldn't have something specific that he uses. More troublingly, Jeremy can't believe that he wouldn't know. He knows everything about Michael, from the freckle on his left hand between his ring and middle finger, to his favorite flavor of gummy bear, to the names and ages of his six cousins back in the Philippines. 

Jeremy grabs a bottle at random. It's smooth, colored in a wholesome and expensive beige, with a sprig of some kind of herb on the front. He opens it up, and sniffs, but it's overly sweet and unfamiliar. The next bottle is a lot more lavendery than it is Michaely, and the third is roses. The fourth has coconut oil in it, and it isn't right either, but by the time Jeremy has gotten through all of them, it's the least wrong, so he grabs it. He snatches a conditioner at random, because nothing is labeled with an ingredient list including weed and essence of convenience store funk.

Down in the kitchen, Michael is sitting at the table, tapping his leg and playing a game on his phone. He probably could’ve taken an entire shower in all the time that Jeremy took. Jeremy opens his mouth, and shuts it again, searching for how to begin. If their roles were reversed, Michael wouldn't make it weird. 

Jeremy takes a deep breath. _So, how do you want to do this?_ he wants to say, but it's not right. He should be telling Michael what to do, giving him some direction. 

“So-ink,” is what comes out of Jeremy’s mouth. He tries again. “Soink!” 

“Soink?” 

“ _So!_ Do you to _sink_!” The words come out overly bright and far too loud. “Do you… want to _go_ … to _the_ sink?” 

(And in today’s production of Washing Michael’s Hair the role of Jeremiah Heere will be played by William Shatner!)

Michael laughs, and Jeremy feels his shoulders loosen, as he goes to sit down next to him, laughing as well. “Okay,” he says, when he catches his breath. “Come on. Let's wash stuff.” 

Cautiously, Jeremy puts his hands on Michael’s shoulders, nudging him towards the sink. His grip steadies a little, when he realizes how easily Michael is letting himself be led. Jeremy turns the hot water tap, waits for the steam to rise around the faucet, then turns on the cold a little at a time, testing the flow with his fingers until he's got a good temperature. 

“Take off your glasses and lean over,” Jeremy says. Michael does, and once his hair is wet enough, Jeremy squeezes some shampoo into his hands, and starts to work it in. He needs to lean into the other boy to get the right angle, close enough to feel the rise and fall of Michael’s breaths steady out as Jeremy rubs in the shampoo. 

There’s intimacy in this. It's in the touch of Jeremy’s fingers against the nape of Michael's neck and just beneath his hair line, and the scrape of nails against Michael’s scalp. It's nothing that Jeremy would ever do with anybody else, but after months of blocking out his best friend, it feels good to just touch him, to know that he's real and solid. 

“I'm worried about you,” Jeremy says. 

Michael hums in response. Jeremy runs his palms through Michael’s hair as he rinses it. 

“I'm worried about you too,” Michael says. Jeremy reaches for the conditioner. 

“I’ll be fine.” 

“Me too.” 

“But you’re not…” 

Michael shrugs. Jeremy doesn't say anything, but continues to run his fingers through the now-slippery strands of hair. Conditioner has to stay in for a few minutes. That's something the Squip taught Jeremy. Personal grooming, for dudes at least, was a matter of putting enough time into certain essential things to make it look like one didn't put any time into anything at all, but just happened to have good hair and clear skin and cool clothes anyway. Like, in a pinch, the right posture and a devil may care attitude would get most guys through, but not for slobs like Jeremy, and the Squip had never tired of reminding him that Michael was even worse. 

Jeremy flinches, and buries his head in the dampened crook of Michael’s neck. He takes his hands out of Michael’s hair, hugging him from behind. 

A breath. “I'm really sorry,” Jeremy says. 

Michael doesn't answer, so Jeremy turns the water back on, rinsing the conditioner out. 

“I forgot to bring a towel,” Jeremy says. 

“It's cool. It's whatever.” Michael straightens. He pushes back his hair, letting it drip on his sweatshirt. He wipes his face, and puts his glasses back on. He reaches out for Jeremy, stops, then starts again, holding him by the crook of the elbow. “I need time,” Michael says. 

Jeremy nods. 

“You do, too,” Michael continues.

Another nod. 

“Right, come here.” Michael folds Jeremy into a hug. “Every time you look at me these days, it's like you expert me to murder a puppy in front of you. Like, the only reason I know for sure you’re looking at me and not through me is that you get this fucking tragic look on your face.” 

“I missed you.” 

“Same. Same.” Michael pats Jeremy’s back. “Look. Why don't you go home. I'm gonna change my socks and relearn how to be a human or something.” 

“And shave.” 

“Yeah. Seriously fuck this beard.” Michael releases Jeremy, to run a hand over his chin. “I mean, my parents hate it, so that's fun, but I hate it too, so it's a kind of a sucky rebellion. Might as well just get stoned in my basement, and call it a day.” 

“Yeah,” says Jeremy. “But, like, take care of yourself first, alright?” 

“Or what? You’ll take care of shit for me?” 

“Guess I owe you that much.” 

Michael shakes his head. “Thanks, man, but I think I'll change my own socks, and let you continue to owe me.” 

“It's really hard to begin things,” Jeremy says. “I mean, sometimes it's really hard to start.” 

“Like with going to school and stuff?” 

“Right.” 

“But now we’re both—”

“Started?” 

“Started.” 

Jeremy just hopes that they can go forward. With any luck, they’ll be able to from here.


End file.
